Communication & Advocacy

On Tuesday, a woman infected with the Zika virus gave birth to a girl with microcephaly, a malformed head, in New Jersey. Federal officials say there are more than 300 pregnant women possibly infected with Zika around the country. Yet every time an emergency like this happens, public health officials must go begging bowl in hand to Congress for the funds to deal with it. And as the current squabble between Republicans and President Obama over money for the Zika virus shows, there’s no guarantee of significant or even timely relief.

The government has lifted the ban it imposed last month on restaurants, cafes and food vendors after cholera out-break which has claimed 57 lives and affected more than three thousand people.

Speaking at the weekly media briefing on the 'state of cholera', the Director of Prevention - Ministry of Health, Dr Mohamed Dahoma, said that restaurants and the popular Forodhani Public Park in stone town (classified as area A), have been conditionally allowed to open business.

Between 30 April and 5 May 2016, the National IHR Focal Point for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia notified WHO of 4 additional cases of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS-CoV), including one fatal case.

Details of the cases

A 39-year-old, non-national, male living in Riyadh city is a household contact of another MERS-CoV (see case no. 2 below). He is asymptomatic and identified through tracing of contacts. The patient, who has no comorbid conditions, tested positive for MERS-CoV on 5 May. The patient is currently in home isolation.

Diagnosing malaria may soon be as easy taking a simple breath test, according to researchers.

“We really envision this working just like a breathalyzer test when you get pulled over for drunk driving,” said Dr. Audrey Odom, an assistant professor of pediatrics and molecular biology at Washington University in St. Louis.

When it comes to Zika testing, urine is better than blood, according to new guidelines issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The CDC recently updated its interim diagnostic testing guidance for the virus to recommend real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (rRT-PCR) testing for urine specimens obtained two weeks after the illness starts.